


First Day of My Life

by Angst_BuriTTo, ClaraxBarton



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Friends to Lovers, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, War Veteran Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-06
Updated: 2019-06-06
Packaged: 2020-04-11 16:58:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19113922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angst_BuriTTo/pseuds/Angst_BuriTTo, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClaraxBarton/pseuds/ClaraxBarton
Summary: Every year, Bucky takes a week vacation in the simulated paradise of Tortuga. And every year, he hopes to spend it with Steve Rogers.A Cap RBB fic with art by TT-Angst-Queen.





	First Day of My Life

**Author's Note:**

> As always, all of the thanks to Ro for the extremely necessary and VERY fucking appreciated hand-holding. And the always highest quality beta reading.
> 
> Also, thanks to the Mods of the CapRBB for being so damn awesome.
> 
> And to my amazing artist!

 

* * *

* * *

 

 

It was the smell that got him first.

 

Fresh air, the bite of brine, the faint hint of marine life and the almost incongruous whiff of vanilla that blended everything together.

 

As soon as the shuttle doors opened, Bucky closed his eyes and breathed in deeply.

 

There was something hopeful about that first, crisp gush of wind against his face, something that was highlighted by the blindingly bright sun overhead and the sounds of life just past the doors. But it was the smell that really made Bucky feel like he was in a whole other world.

 

Which, of course, was the entire point of Tortuga. Hydra Corporation, the leading tech developer in Europe, had developed their first immersive theme park ten years ago. Asgard had been an immediate financial success - people practically threw their money at Hydra for the chance to “live” in a mythological land of Nordic warriors and gods for a week. Hydra combined state-of-the-art AI, biotech, sensory projections and virtual reality with immaculately-detailed physical landscaping to create the environment that allowed up to one hundred human guests to occupy the world of Asgard and interact with Hydra characters and creations.

 

After Asgard, Hydra branched out to make a western-themed park - the ill-fated Tombstone - but had managed to recoup their losses after a hushed-up incident at the park forced it to close only six months after opening.

 

Tortuga, Hydra’s pirate cove, had opened five years ago, and Bucky’s sister had purchased passes for the both of them that inaugural week.

 

Bucky, who had maybe been a casually-devoted D&D player since childhood, and who had immersed himself in rpg games after being discharged from the Army because the mind-numbing drudgery of his day job as an accountant was literally too much for him to handle, had been cautiously optimistic about his baby sister’s way too expensive birthday gift for him that year.

 

His cautious optimism had immediately been rewarded: Tortuga was amazing.

 

From the smell of the ocean and the pirate shanty town to the pre-planned adventures to the trouble he and Becca had caused all on their own to the AI characters to the clothes Bucky got to pick out - it was all beyond his wildest dreams.

 

A new, exciting world that was both real and absolutely, wonderfully fantastical, and not at all linked to his reality.

 

A world with Steve Rogers in it.

 

They met entirely by accident, that first trip. Bucky and Becca had found themselves in a tavern brawl with some AI after Bucky caught them stealing from the tavern owner, and they had maybe been dramatically outnumbered and in deep shit. Well, as deep of shit as the AI were programmed to allow for - even the AI punches were programmed to cause minimal pain, and only Bucky and Becca were capable of actually causing permanent damage or killing their opponents.

 

Even so, Bucky and Becca were facing down eight burly AI pirates, and it looked like their attempt to ‘white hat’ their way through the trip was about to crash and burn when Steve Rogers walked into the tavern every inch the swashbuckling hero and smirked while he punched his way through the AIs like this was the best day of his life.

 

Later, when Bucky, Becca and Steve sat on the beach and shared a bottle of rum between them, Steve revealed himself to be sarcastic and fierce and funny - and hot as hell. Bucky was immediately smitten, which Becca recognized with a roll of her eyes, but either Steve hadn’t been interested or hadn’t picked up on the desire in Bucky’s eyes, because after spending the next two days together, Steve walked Bucky and Becca back to the shuttle and shook hands with the both of them, winking and saying he hoped to see them again soon.

 

And Bucky, guided by an unchecked impulse, had called out that he would be back next year on his birthday too - would meet Steve at the same tavern next year if he planned to come back.

 

Steve had smiled, had adjusted his tricorn hat, and shrugged.

 

So, of course, Bucky had gone home, gone back to his real life as an accountant with raging PTSD issues and too much time playing World of Warcraft, and had immediately bought a week pass for himself for the following year.

 

He had also maybe indulged in some light internet stalking.

 

But Steve Rogers, artist, originally from Brooklyn, did not come up in any of Bucky’s admittedly superficial searches.

 

So Bucky pined, for a whole year, and in the month leading up to his return to Tortuga, maybe indulged in a few fantasies of what he would do if Steve was waiting for him at the tavern.

 

And Steve was waiting for him. Tricorn hat at a jaunty angle just like last year, but he had chosen different load-in clothes this year: dark blue shirt open at the throat and black leather trousers that were way too tight to be decent and tall black boots that Bucky would be genuinely happy to lick if Steve let him.

 

They spent a week together, a week of ridiculous game challenges and treasure hunting and sleeping under the fake stars and warm breezes of Tortuga and telling stories from their childhoods and sharing way, way more with each other than two relative strangers probably would in other circumstances.

 

Bucky had left smitten the first year. He left… more smitten the second year.

 

And the third. And the fourth.

 

And now, it was the fifth. The fifth year of meeting Steve Rogers in Tortuga for a week of pirating and pining, and Bucky- Bucky had to act. Had to say something. Had to know if he was the only one who wished this wasn’t just one week out of fifty-something weeks. Who wanted to try a relationship in the real world. Who was terrified to try a relationship in the real world.

 

Because, as much therapy as Bucky had attended and as much of his shitstorm of a life he had managed to sort of get control of, he was still pretty fucked-up and still not a catch and still- still not the carefree adventurer that he got to be in Tortuga.

 

Obviously. Of course.

 

Just like Steve Rogers, Brooklyn-born artist, couldn’t be such a ridiculously good guy who jumped into every fight he found on the side of the little guy.

 

So… so, this was it.

 

It really was, because Becca had told him it was. Becca, his kid sister who was somehow an aeronautical engineer and brilliant and grown up and so smart it was scary. Becca had said, this was it. No more waiting all year for one week to live his life.

 

He had to start living his life all year - with or without Steve Rogers in it.

 

So. Here he was, making his way down the dock and towards the Saucy Maeve Tavern where he would wait for Steve and hope that this year would be different.

 

No, he reminded himself, he would make this year different.

 

-o-

 

“This seat taken?”

 

Bucky looked up from his second glass of grog - he still, after five years, wasn’t entirely sure what grog was, but well, when in Tortuga…

 

The man looming over Bucky’s table was not Steve.

 

The man looming over Bucky’s table was dark-haired and sharp-featured even under his scruffy facial hair and dressed entirely in black.

 

Huh.

 

Bucky wondered if he was another guest or one of the Hydra AI bots.

 

“Don’t do anything stupid,” Bucky said.

 

The man frowned, and then his expression eased into neutral.

 

A bot, then.

 

It was one of the code-phrases that Hydra listed on the brochures so that guests could tell if they were interacting with a bot or not. Some guests preferred not to check, of course. And for the most part, Bucky liked to let the illusion stand, liked to wonder if he was engaging with a real human or a fake one.

 

But, well, he was waiting for Steve.

 

He grinned as he remembered Steve’s response to the code-phrase that very first year.

 

How can I? You’re taking all the stupid with you.

 

“Seat’s taken,” Bucky decided. He wasn’t in the mood to start an in-game adventure until Steve was there, and talking to a bot inevitably led to some quest, and Bucky had never had the fortitude to turn down the chance for adventure.

 

The bot’s expression became animated again as he re-engaged. He looked at the empty seat and then at Bucky.

 

“You sure? You look awfully lonely, poppet.”

 

The bot was acting on the stored data of Bucky’s preferences - data from the intake form Bucky had filled out before entering Tortuga. Bucky had checked off his preference for men, but he had also checked off a NO for physical relationships with bots. That was a tangle of autonomy and consent that Bucky wanted nothing to do with.

 

So, if the bot was actively flirting with him now, it was because he was either trying to provoke Bucky into a fight or convince him to soften up and let him join Bucky and then entice him into whatever adventure he was programmed to lead Bucky on.

 

Bucky sighed.

 

He didn’t feel like getting into a brawl. Actually, after that first year with Becca, Bucky tended to avoid fights unless they were ones that Steve managed to pull him into. It just felt… not necessarily wrong, but not entirely right to be violent towards a bot that was programmed to just… take it. Even if the bots fought back, it was just to make it more exciting - not to actually defend themselves.

 

“Even if he was lonely, he wouldn’t be interested in you, Rumlow.”

 

Bucky couldn’t help it, he grinned at the sound of the familiar gruff voice.

 

Steve.

 

He turned his head, and sure enough, Steve was standing behind him, glaring at the bot - at Rumlow, Steve had called him. So, presumably, Steve had encountered him before. Which meant Rumlow wasn’t a new bot, but one of the long-term fixtures of Tortuga that Steve had met during a previous trip.

 

“Hey,” Bucky said to Steve, knowing he sounded… exactly as smitten as he felt.

 

Steve’s warm blue gaze flicked down to him, scowl on his face softening.

 

“Hey, yourself,” he said to Bucky, corners of his lips twitching into a brief upward smile before he returned to glaring at Rumlow.

 

It was weird, but the bot still hadn’t moved.

 

“Am I supposed to take orders from the captain now?” Rumlow sneered.

 

The captain?

 

Bucky looked back at Steve again.

 

He wasn’t wearing a uniform - and there were plenty of uniform load-in options. His dark navy frock coat looked a little frayed, his brown canvas trousers a little dirty, his black boots in desperate need of a polish and his white shirt open nearly to his waist and a little yellowed with age and neglect.

 

Maybe Steve had chosen to be a ship captain on the load-in? That was an option, one that Bucky had never thought to choose, but one that Becca had, the one time she came back to Tortuga on her own after their first time.

 

“You’ll be taking something,” Steve said, voice low and dangerous and, well, sexy as hell to Bucky since he wasn’t the one being threatened. Then again, even if he was the target of Steve’s ire… Bucky was pretty sure that that voice, that unforgiving stance and those determined eyes, would have him down on his knees before Steve immediately.

 

Rumlow just laughed, though.

 

“Sure, sure. Have fun with your punk.”

 

He moved off, and Steve slowly approached the table.

 

“May I?” he asked, while gesturing to the chair across from Bucky.

 

“Of course. Been saving it for you.”

 

Steve sat down and gave Bucky a tired, grateful smile.

 

“Rough year?” Bucky asked him.

 

The laugh Steve gave him was rough, low and sad. It made Bucky want to reach out and pull Steve close.

 

“Something like that,” Steve muttered. He shook his head and shoved a few unruly strands of blond hair off his forehead. “What about you? You look good, Buck.”

 

Bucky was a grown man. He absolutely did not blush when Steve looked at him and said those words.

 

It was just hot in Tortuga. And he had had two glasses of grog.

 

“Thanks,” he mumbled. “I’ve been okay. Better, really. Got a new job.”

 

“Oh, yeah?” Steve leaned his elbows on the table, smile broad and engaged now, some of the sadness fading away from his expression.

 

Bucky nodded.

 

“Yep. I’m still doing accountant stuff - but I applied for that job with the non-profit I told you about last year.”

 

“The Stark Veterans Assistance program?” Steve asked.

 

And it had to mean something, right, that Steve remembered that kind of detail after a whole year? Even if they hadn’t tried to connect in the real world - Steve had remembered.

 

“Yeah. I got it. I’m the Accounts Manager now, which is… kind of terrifying, because if I fuck up a whole lot of good people get screwed over.”

 

Steve reached out and gave Bucky’s hand a quick, warm squeeze.

 

“You won’t fuck up. You’re brilliant, Buck, and thoughtful. I’m sure you’re doing great.”

 

So, yeah, okay, he was definitely blushing now, face lighting up like a damn stop light.

 

“I’m trying,” Bucky mumbled. He cleared his throat. “What about you? What have you been up to? Any gallery showings?”

 

Steve laughed.

 

“No. Nothing like that. I got hired to do some paintings and signs, but… no. I don’t think I’ll ever have a real show.” He shrugged, broad shoulders looking impossibly small for a moment.

 

“Steve-”

 

“It’s fine. I’m okay. Actually,” Steve gave Bucky a furtive little grin and looked around the tavern before reaching into his coat pocket and withdrawing a small, dark leatherbound notebook, “got something for you.”

 

Bucky took the notebook from Steve and debated whether or not he should immediately shove it into his pocket or risk opening it.

 

Hydra had very strict policies about not bringing in items from the outside world - no cellphones, no technology of any kind, no papers, no books, nothing except for approved medical devices or medication, and those went through an incredibly complicated vetting process.

 

But Steve had smuggled this notebook into Tortuga, and Bucky… Bucky had to look at it.

 

“Happy Birthday,” Steve said, voice soft amid the clamour of the tavern.

 

Bucky opened the notebook. It reminded him of the moleskine notebooks that his sister used sometimes to scribble notes in, the same kind that Bucky had carried around constantly when he was in the Army so that he could write down all of the shit that happened - so that he could convince himself he wasn’t going crazy.

 

The first page was blank.

 

The second page was an inscription.

 

For Bucky,

A year of thinking about you

SGR

 

That was…

 

Bucky looked up at Steve, and found that the other man was looking back at him, gaze intense.

 

“Steve.”

 

“It’s too much? It’s- it’s not right,” Steve assumed, already reaching for the notebook.

 

Bucky hauled it back against his chest.

 

“No. It’s- it’s right. It’s perfect. It’s everything, Steve.”

 

They held eye contact for a long moment, Steve still tense and Bucky doing his level best to convey just how much he cared about Steve - how much he thought about Steve when they were apart, and how much Steve meant to him.

 

Steve’s shoulders relaxed and his lips curved upwards, slow and steady and gorgeous.

 

Bucky smiled back, and it felt, all at once, as if he could finally breathe deeply and evenly for the first time in forever.

 

He made himself look back at the notebook.

 

The third page was a sketch of Bucky, sitting on one of Tortuga’s beaches, leaning back against the trunk of a tree, shirtless, eyes closed and face lax in sleep.

 

“After we went swimming, in that cove,” Steve explained.

 

Bucky smiled.

 

He remembered. Remembered the way Steve had smiled and laughed in delight when a group of porpoises swam alongside them for a few minutes in the shallows.

 

Bucky turned to the next page.

 

It was another sketch of Bucky, this time sitting down cross-legged in the sand while a gaggle of children - Hydra’s version of indigenous people to Tortuga were golden-skinned and green-eyed, with sun-bleached dark hair and a programmed fascination for any “real” visitors to their villages - swarmed around him and braided his hair.

 

Bucky looked up from the sketch and saw that Steve was smiling at him, the expression slight and soft.

 

He wanted to say something to Steve - hell, he wanted to say a lot of things to Steve - but he couldn’t figure out what the right one might be.

 

Instead, Bucky looked back at the notebook and continued to flip through it.

 

They were all sketches of him.

 

Every single one.

 

Some were times Bucky clearly remembered - things from last year or the year before, or even some as far back as that first year with Becca - but some were… not memories. There were sketches of Bucky in suits - modern suits that, while definitely not to Bucky’s style or taste, were far from the clothing he wore in Tortuga. There were sketches of Bucky drinking coffee, talking on a phone, Bucky staring up at the night sky and grinning, Bucky sitting in front of a computer with glasses on, typing away with a slight frown on his face. Things that Steve had never seen, things that weren’t… quite how Bucky was, probably, but close enough for someone to guess at.

 

“So, uh…” Bucky licked his lips and considered the last sketch in the book: Bucky’s left arm covered in scars but, over those, the delicate ink lines of two birds in flight. Steve had drawn those on him, Bucky’s third visit, when Bucky had told Steve about getting blown up by an IED, about losing his whole unit, about looking at his arm and thinking it was the only thing he still had that was real sometimes, and sometimes looking at it and thinking that his left arm didn’t belong to him at all, that he didn’t deserve even that. Steve had looked so sad and solemn and fierce, staring into Bucky’s eyes long enough that Bucky had had to look away. And then Steve had drawn on him, had painted freedom and hope on Bucky’s arm, and it had been… maybe one of the best things to happen to Bucky since joining the Army all those years ago.

 

Steve looked back at Bucky, features strained and cautious. As if he thought Bucky’s reaction might be anything other than awe.

 

“Steve, I love you.”

 

So, that…

 

That was not what Bucky had planned on saying.

 

Definitely, one-hundred percent, not the right thing to say. Not a normal thing to say. Not…

 

Steve grinned, wide and crooked and brilliant.

 

“Yeah, Buck?”

 

And Bucky… Bucky felt his face heat, because seriously, what the fuck?

 

“Yeah,” Bucky confirmed, because taking it back seemed even worse than just acknowledging how truly pathetic Bucky was.

 

“Good,” Steve said.

 

“Good?”

 

Steve nodded.

 

“Yep. I’d hate to be the only one in this feelin’ that way.”

 

And…

 

Ok.

 

Well.

 

Okay, then.

 

“Yeah?” Bucky asked.

 

“Yeah,” Steve nodded, ducking his head a bit but still looking at Bucky with his bright, blue eyes. “Yeah.”

 

Bucky looked at Steve, and Steve looked back at him and-

 

“There they are!”

 

Both Steve and Bucky looked up at the shouted words.

 

It was Rumlow, and he wasn’t alone. Instead, he had about half a dozen guys behind him, all arrayed in black clothes that looked a stiff breeze away from falling apart, they were so worn and salt-crusted.

 

“Fuck,” Steve snarled, low and dark.

 

Bucky looked over at him and arched an eyebrow.

 

“This about that captain thing? What did you load-out with this time?”

 

Steve didn’t really have time to answer, though - because Rumlow and his men were charging forward, and then everything was just a blur of fighting and splintering wood and spilled grog and the tavern’s other patrons screaming and shouting and running or joining in and-

 

-o-

 

“Ow,” Bucky complained.

 

He hurt everywhere.

 

Steve scowled, not so much at Bucky as at the whole world, it felt like.

 

“Yeah. Sorry,” Steve sighed. “We’re almost there.”

 

The brawl had been… painful. And not nearly as one-sided as these things normally were. Bucky wondered if there might have been a “real” guest in Rumlow’s group, because he was definitely feeling the hits harder than he normally did. That, or maybe he was getting old?

 

Painful as it had been, Steve and Bucky did finally manage to put everyone else down, and they staggered out of the tavern after Steve offered profuse apologies to the Madame - Natasha - and led Bucky down the narrow alleyways of Tortuga towards… well, actually, Bucky had no idea where they were going.

 

‘There’ turned out to be a little sloop tied off near a rag-tag collection of similarly small and rather sad-looking sailing craft.

 

Steve clamoured aboard first, and then held out a hand to help Bucky into the boat.

 

It wasn’t the first time they had sailed together - wasn’t the first time Steve had even offered Bucky his hand - but this time was different. Because, this time, Steve had said that he loved Bucky, and Bucky had said he loved Steve and-

 

And when Bucky put his hand in Steve’s, Steve gave a little tug and Bucky all but tumbled into his arms.

 

Steve smirked, looking damn proud of himself despite the beginnings of a black eye.

 

Bucky rolled his eyes, but Steve didn’t let go, and Bucky… didn’t try to pull free.

 

“Can I kiss you?” Steve asked, and in the wild, golden light of the sunset, as he looked down at Bucky, it felt like the most perfect moment in the world.

 

“You’d better,” Bucky responded.

 

Steve grinned and ducked his head down, lips still curved upwards when they met Bucky’s, and- Okay, this, this was the most perfect moment in the world.

 

Steve’s lips were soft and warm and felt so damn good, pressing against Bucky’s just hard enough, but still somehow light, gentle, and Bucky breathed in deeply.

 

Salt and Steve.

 

Too soon, Steve pulled away.

 

“C’mon, I want to show you something.”

 

Bucky reluctantly let go of Steve and settled into the sloop, making sure to keep himself out of the way because he had sailed with Steve in the past, and they had both learned that Bucky was absolutely not helpful when it came to anything that wasn’t tying knots or bailing out water.

 

So Bucky sat, and Steve manned the boat and set them off towards what looked like the open sea but, Bucky knew from brochures and maps, was only a few hundred yards of open water before a current would change their course back towards land.

 

Steve steered the boat, and he looked strong, fierce and golden and perfect, and Bucky watched him and wondered.

 

What happened now?

 

A five-year crush - hell, they had spent a grand total of twenty-six days together in all the time they had known each other - and… what next?

 

What had kept Steve from telling Bucky how to find him before, and would that change now? Would Bucky finally get to be with Steve? Would he get to show Steve what kind of suits he really wore? Or would… would they still have just this? Just Tortuga?

 

An hour ago, Bucky had been riding high. Now?

 

Now, he was back to wondering the same things he always did: was he, Bucky, worth the effort?

 

Why would Steve - glorious, gorgeous Steve - want anything-

 

“You’re thinking too hard,” Steve’s voice broke into Bucky’s thoughts.

 

“Just wondering what happens next,” Bucky sighed.

 

Steve’s gaze flicked his way.

 

“What do you mean?”

 

Bucky shrugged and gestured broadly, taking in all of Tortuga.

 

“What happens after this? Next week, when I go home - are you finally going to… I don’t know, are we going to try for something real? Or are we just going to keep meeting up once a year and-”

 

“Buck,” Steve interrupted him, voice firm.

 

Bucky swallowed and made himself look at Steve.

 

“I don’t know what happens next, but I want to try - I want to try anything you want to try, okay? Whatever you want - I’ll do anything for you, Buck. Anything.”

 

And that - okay.

 

Well, that was a lot. A lot.

 

Kinda like just blurting out that he loved Steve. Kind of like… filling a sketchbook up with drawings of Bucky’s face.

 

Maybe they were just that kind of extra?

 

It made Bucky smile, a little.

 

“Anything, huh?”

 

Steve nodded, expression fierce.

 

“You’re the most - Buck, I’ve never met anyone like you.” Steve’s lips twisted, the expression not quite a smile. “You make me dream all kinds of things are possible, Buck.”

 

And wasn’t that how Bucky felt, every time he looked at Steve? Every time Steve smiled at him? As if anything was possible, as if Bucky deserved… deserved more than he had.

 

Bucky looked back at Steve, and something of what he felt must have shown on his face because Steve’s expression smoothed out, and he nodded and turned back to focus on the horizon.

 

“You like waterfalls, right?” Steve asked, and the question felt apropos of nothing they had been talking about.

 

“Uh, yeah. I do.”

 

“Good. I found one - I found one that I don’t think anyone’s been to before. Not any guests, at least. It’s like magic, in the moonlight. You’re gonna love it.”

 

Bucky settled down again, mind and heart at ease for the first time in a very, very long time.

 

“I can’t wait to see it.”

 

-o-

 

Steve was right.

 

The skies in Tortuga were digital projections - it wasn’t like anyone could get close enough for it to matter - and the weather itself was programmed to cycle through rain and sun and everything in between. Bucky didn’t really know what the programming was for the moon cycles - every year he had been at Tortuga, there had been a full moon on one of the nights, and that just wasn’t possible, going by the ‘real’ lunar calendar.

 

Still, it was one of those things he didn’t question too much while he was in Tortuga. Especially tonight, when there was a full moon and a sky that was black-purple and glittering with millions of stars that Bucky would never be able to see back home.

 

The waterfall must be from some kind of pool or lake - it wasn’t one of the rivers on the parchment map Bucky had - and the water spilled over high cliffs in a steady stream, caught in a sandy cove that at low tide was cut off from the ocean, and at high tide connected to it just barely.

 

With the sky above them in all directions, cut off only slightly by the cliffs and the waterfall itself, it very nearly felt like they were in space. Stars and moon reflected on the water, the only sounds that of the waves and the waterfall and their own breathing.

 

It felt like they were alone, the only two people in the universe.

 

It was perfect.

 

Bucky grinned at Steve, and Steve grinned back.

 

“Feel like a swim?” Bucky asked him.

 

Steve rolled his eyes.

 

“If there was a way for you to be a mermaid, you’d pick that option, wouldn’t you?” Steve joked, but he was already tugging off his frock coat.

 

It wasn’t quite a race to get undressed, but it wasn’t not either.

 

Bucky made it into the water first, stumbling through the shallows and then plunging headfirst under when it was deep enough. He surfaced in time to see Steve, naked and washed silver by the moonlight, stride through the water towards him.

 

Steve was so beautiful, body all strong lines that were as determined as his will, hard and smooth all at once, and he was- he was Bucky’s, Bucky realized.

 

Steve was his.

 

Bucky swam closer to Steve, until they were both in the shallows, and then he stood up, water lapping at his thighs.

 

“I love you,” Bucky said again, because he could.

 

“I love you,” Steve repeated, face nearly splitting from his broad grin. He wrapped his arms around Bucky and pulled him close, until they were touching from thigh to lips, and kissed him.

 

Bucky slid his hands over Steve’s shoulders, down his broad back and to his trim waist, finally touching the man he had been lusting after for years.

 

Steve sighed into his mouth, tongue caressing Bucky’s, and Steve’s own hands, broad and calloused and strong, gripped Bucky’s ass and lifted.

 

Bucky broke free of the kiss with a surprised gasp, because Bucky wasn’t small - even after all this time as a civilian - but Steve was lifting him like he weighed nothing and-

 

Steve lost his footing or his balance or something, and they both tumbled into the water.

 

It took Bucky a few seconds to surface, and he sputtered, trying to catch his breath and cough out the sea water that had filled his mouth and lungs.

 

But Steve was there, only his head above the water, and he was grinning at Bucky.

 

“You did that on purpose - you little shit,” Bucky splashed him.

 

Steve splashed back with a laugh, and then it was all-out war as they grappled together, trying to dunk each other under, the pretense of the struggle allowing them to touch and tease and caress and be close, and it felt so good and so right, and Bucky couldn’t help but smile every time Steve managed to dunk him under.

 

-o-

 

Steve coaxed Bucky into laying down on the smooth boulders nearest the pool and, still naked, they curled together and looked up at the stars.

 

“Never knew there were so many,” Steve murmured into Bucky’s absolutely disastrous mess of damp and tangled hair.

 

“Could you see any, growing up in Brooklyn?” Bucky asked.

 

Steve shrugged, shoulder barely moving under Bucky’s head.

 

“Sometimes? A few. Sometimes, in the summer, I’d sit on the fire escape, and if the wind was strong enough to carry away the coal dust, I could see.”

 

“The coal dust?” Bucky asked.

 

Steve shrugged again.

 

“Whatever made the clouds. The-”

 

“Pollution,” Bucky supplied for him.

 

“Yeah,” Steve agreed.

 

“Plenty of stars in Indiana,” Bucky sighed. “Afghanistan too.”

 

Steve squeezed Bucky’s left arm, pulling him even closer, until Bucky was almost half on top of Steve.

 

“What about… where you live now?” Steve asked, voice cautious.

 

It was the one thing they had never talked about, before. Their real lives - their grown-up, adult lives outside of Tortuga.

 

“Atlanta. Well, Buckhead - but Atlanta. Some nights, I can see stars, but mostly there’s too much light pollution. How about you?”

 

Steve just shrugged.

 

“Nothing like that. Tell me more about Atlanta.”

 

It felt a lot like a dodge, but… but Steve had asked, and he never had before. And… that was something, right?

 

Bucky opened his mouth, feeling uneasy but ready to tell Steve more about himself anyway, but then Steve stopped him.

 

“Buck - Bucky, I love you. I really do.”

 

“I know. You said. I love you too.”

 

“No, Buck, I- I’ve never felt this way about anyone else. You- I didn’t know I could feel this way.”

 

Steve pulled away from Bucky enough to sit up, leaving Bucky with a view of Steve’s back, curved away from from, as if Steve was hiding.

 

“Steve-”

 

“I’m not supposed to, Buck! It’s not-”

 

“Steve.” Bucky got an arm around his shoulders, angled Steve towards them until their foreheads were touching. “Steve, I’ve got you.”

 

The blond-haired man drew in a shuddery breath, let it out slowly, leaned into Bucky.

 

“I feel like I’m going crazy,” Steve said, lips quirked up in a sad, little smile.

 

“Because you love me?” Bucky asked, afraid of the answer.

 

Steve closed his eyes.

 

“Because I love.”

 

That…

 

Bucky really wasn’t sure what to say to that. Sure as hell wasn’t sure how he was supposed to feel about an answer like that. On one hand, it made it pretty clear that this wasn’t about him. But on the other hand… Steve thought he was crazy because he felt love? Was it because it was too soon or-

 

Steve abruptly pulled away from Bucky.

 

“There’s- You don’t understand yet,” Steve said, the words sounding almost like an explanation.

 

Bucky frowned at him, a question on his lips.

 

Steve stood, slow, wincing as though his joints hurt, as though he was tired and hurt and-

 

Bucky stared.

 

He couldn’t not.

 

In all their years - in all their 26 days together - Bucky had seen glimpses of Steve’s body. Had spent entirely too long gazing at Steve’s toned chest and impossibly narrow waist.  Had, tonight, gotten a very much appreciated full frontal view before and during their night-time swim together.

 

But this…

 

He’d never stared at Steve Rogers’ bare ass before.

 

There was a lot to admire - the dimples at the base of his spine, the unreal plumpness of his ass cheeks and the strong muscles of his thighs.

 

But Bucky couldn’t even focus on any of that. Not when the only thing he could really see, could only stare at, was the tattoo.

 

A dark circle, inside a floating skull, surrounded by six arms that curled with purpose.

 

Hydra.

 

It was their logo. It was all over the brochures, the digital ads, the tickets Bucky had saved, actually saved in his copy of Asimov and-

 

Oh, god. Oh, fuck.

 

That was some kind of painful fucking irony.

 

Because that fucking stamp was on Steve’s ass, and that could only mean one thing.

 

Steve was an AI bot.

 

Steve- Steve wasn’t real.

 

Steve wasn’t-

 

Wait. Maybe it was a fake. Steve had said he was an artist. Maybe it was some kind of… statement? Some finger to the man or some joke or some clever tattoo or-

 

But Steve was looking over his shoulder, down at Bucky, and there was determination in his face, sadness in his eyes, despair in the downward slope of his mouth.

 

“Don’t do anything stupid,” Bucky said, repeating the code phrase, even though-

 

Steve smiled sadly.

 

“How can I? You’re taking all the stupid with you.”

 

It was the same thing Steve had said to him the first time, when the words ought to have rendered Steve momentarily speechless and still, a kind of temporary pause so that guests could ‘slow down’ the interaction.

 

There was another one. One Bucky had never tried.

 

“I’m with you ‘til the end of the line.” It was the full stop command - the one that would freeze an AI until a Hydra employee checked in on the guest or the bot and manually rebooted it.

 

Steve’s sad smile wobbled.

 

“How about for what comes after?” Steve asked, voice soft.

 

Bucky choked on a breath and realized - fuck. Breathing.

 

He needed to do that.

 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

 

Oh, god. What- He’d just- What the hell- What if-

 

“It’s okay. I gotcha, Buck. It’s okay. It’s okay. We’re here. You’re here. It’s okay. It’s okay.” Strong arms were around him, calloused fingers smoothing over his back, a warm cheek against his forehead.

 

But it wasn’t okay. It was so very desperately, ridiculously not okay.

 

What the fucking shit was Bucky going to do now?

 

What was possibly okay about being in love with a robot?

 

* * *

* * *

 

  
  
  
  
  
  



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